It's a verdict that comes as no surprise to opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi. Today a Myanmar court sentenced her to a three-year jail term with hard labour. The fact that five minutes later the leader of Myanmar's military junta, Than Shwe, stepped in to commute her sentence to 18 months' house arrest was also to be expected. The gesture is his attempt to give an acceptable face to a legal process regarded throughout the world as a show trial.

By our correspondent Michel Maas
 
Nevertheless, a conviction is a conviction and 18 months is long enough for what appears to be the ulterior motive behind the entire process: keeping Aung San Suu Kyi in isolation until after the elections in 2010. According to Myanmar's opposition, these elections are just as much a sham as their leader's trial.
 
The military regime wants to apply a veneer of democracy to its dictatorship. Myanmar (formerly known as Burma) will have a parliament but the junta will remain in charge. In this show, there is no room for a woman such as Aung San Suu Kyi, who would no doubt employ her moral standing, her authority and her enormous popularity to undermine the elections.

A Myanmar expert talks to Newsline (interviewee must remain nameless for security reasons)

 
A more civilised ring
The fact that Suu Kyi is once again being placed under house arrest is also no surprise. A prison sentence would only have fuelled the worldwide criticism of Myanmar. House arrest has a more civilised ring to it and also offers the authorities other advantages. In prison, Suu Kyi would have been able to communicate with the outside world through her fellow prisoners. Shutting her away in her own home enables the authorities to cut off all contact with the outside world.
 
Suu Kyi knows all too well what this means. She has been in custody for 15 of the last 20 years. She was arrested in 1988 when she led mass demonstrations for democracy. Her National League for Democracy achieved a resounding electoral victory over the military regime in 1990. Suu Kyi was all set to become prime minister, but the military overruled the ballot, tightened their hold on power and shut her away under lock and key.
 
Nobel Peace Prize
The situation remains unchanged to this day. In 1991, Aung San Suu Kyi was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize and from that moment on the European Union, the United States and the United Nations have ceaselessly argued for her release. But the military junta ignores their pleas and the countless sanctions imposed on their country. They are well aware of how precarious their position would become if Suu Kyi were to be released.
 
The Nobel laureate has spent the vast majority of her time in captivity at her lakeside home in Yangon. Her last period of house arrest lasted for six years and was due to come to an end in May, with no legal means of extending it. But an uninvited visit by a religious American gave the authorities the ideal excuse they were looking for to extend her detention.
 
Vision
One night in March, John Yettaw, an American Vietnam veteran and admirer of Suu Kyi swam to her home, where he remained for two days. He claimed to have had a vision that she was going to be murdered and he came to warn her. On his way back, he was arrested. The court ruled that his stay at her house was a violation of the conditions of house arrest and that Aung San Suu Kyi should therefore be punished.
 
Suu Kyi testified that she had only given the man shelter because he was exhausted from his swim. She denies having broken any law. She will now return to her home, where she has become the symbol of unshakeable resistance and resolve. John Yettaw himself was sentenced to seven years' hard labour on three charges including "swimming in a non-swimming area". His sentence has not been reduced.
 
Photo: ANP - Demonstrators protest against the continued house arrest of Aung San Suu Kyi outside the Burmese Embassy in London, June 2009.